Texas lawmakers touted their heartbeat law as a crusade to save lives, but the reality of the state's near-total ban on abortion has been deadly.

Hundreds of babies died after the law went into effect, according to a new study published Monday.

The findings in JAMA Pediatrics show that infant deaths rose after Texas’ Senate Bill 8, which banned all abortion after about six weeks from conception. SB 8 became Texas law in September 2021 and U.S. Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to abortion just over nine months later, on June 24, 2022. The high court ruling in the Dobbs case prompted more than a dozen states to issue total bans on abortion. Observers speculate that evidence will also show increases in infant deaths in those states, akin to what Texas has seen, the study said.

“It just points to some of the devastating consequences of abortion bans that maybe people weren't thinking about when they passed these laws,” Alison Gemmill, an assistant professor at Johns Hopkins University’s Bloomberg School of Public Health who authored the study, told USA TODAY. She called the deaths following the Texas heartbeat law its “spillover effects on moms and babies.”

Texas lawmakers touted their heartbeat law as a crusade to save lives, but the reality of the state's near-total ban on abortion has been deadly.

Hundreds of babies died after the law went into effect, according to a new study published Monday.

The findings in JAMA Pediatrics show that infant deaths rose after Texas’ Senate Bill 8, which banned all abortion after about six weeks from conception. SB 8 became Texas law in September 2021 and U.S. Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to abortion just over nine months later, on June 24, 2022. The high court ruling in the Dobbs case prompted more than a dozen states to issue total bans on abortion. Observers speculate that evidence will also show increases in infant deaths in those states, akin to what Texas has seen, the study said.

“It just points to some of the devastating consequences of abortion bans that maybe people weren't thinking about when they passed these laws,” Alison Gemmill, an assistant professor at Johns Hopkins University’s Bloomberg School of Public Health who authored the study, told USA TODAY. She called the deaths following the Texas heartbeat law its “spillover effects on moms and babies.”

In the wake of the law's passage in Texas, more babies died before their first birthday, likely due to birth defects or genetic problems that wouldn't have allowed them to live, the study found. These pregnancies would typically have been terminated by abortion, according to researchers. The Texas heartbeat law does not provide exceptions for pregnancies involving such conditions. Mothers are legally obligated to carry these babies to birth under state law.

Originally Posted By dabbmw2002⏩

Originally Posted By frankdtank20⏩